Roof Beam Reader
Adam Burgess
October Checkpoint with Giveaway #TBR2022RBR
Happy Autumn, TBR Pile Challengers!
Well, it’s autumn here in the United States, but I suppose it is spring elsewhere. Anyhow, those are the two best seasons, aren’t they? So, happiness all-around!
I wonder if you might take a moment to leave a comment this month and share your favorite book from this year’s challenge? If you’ve completed your list or made a lot of progress, share that too! We’d love to cheer you on and feel motivated too, especially those of us who have been stuck for a little bit.
Speaking of stuck, there have only been 9 new links added since last month’s checkpoint, and I have a feeling more reading than that has happened, but maybe not? I for one made just a little progress, finishing one more book from my list (but I haven’t written or posted my thoughts for it yet!), so I can’t fault anyone else. In fact, I’ve been so busy that my postings have essentially boiled down to two per month, once in the first week of each month, wrapping-up the previous month’s reading, and once on the fifteenth, for this challenge. It’s time to take a look at my daily planner and see how I can start managing my time a little better!
Progress: 11 of 12 Completed
I have to say, I really am thrilled with my progress overall, this year. I think, in my ten years hosting this challenge, I’ve only actually finished it once or twice. I don’t think I’ve ever managed to read all fourteen (the main twelve plus two alternates), but that might just happen this year! I’m now at eleven completed and ten reviewed. I’m still “in progress” on what is now book twelve (?), A Poet’s Guide, which is slow going, but I am working through it. Next up, I’ll be reading James Baldwin’s If Beale Street Could Talk. I always look forward to Baldwin!
Books read:
- Chicago Poems (1916) by Carl Sandburg
- When My Brother was an Aztec (2012) by Natalie Diaz
- Sing, Unburied, Sing (2017) by Jesmyn Ward
- Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974) by Robert M. Pirsig
- A People’s History of the United States (1999) by Howard Zinn
- The Warmth of Other Suns (2010) by Isabel Wilkerson
- Crush (2005) by Richard Siken
- A Book of Common Prayer (1977) by Joan Didion
- Madness (2017) by sam sax
- Nature Poem (2017) by Tommy Pico
- Rimbaud Complete Poems and Prose (2003) by Arthur Rimbaud
How are you doing?
Below, you’re going to find the infamous Mr. Linky widget. If you read and review any challenge books this month, please link-up on the widget below. This Mr. Linky will be re-posted every month so that we can compile a large list of all that we’re reading and reviewing together this year. Each review that is linked-up on this widget throughout the year may also earn you entries into future related giveaways, so don’t forget to keep this updated!
MINI-CHALLENGE #4
To be eligible to win a book of your choice ($20USD or less from The Book Depository), please leave a comment on this post sharing your favorite TBR Pile Challenge read of all time. If you’re new this year, it would need to be from this year’s list, but if you’ve participated many times, it can be from any challenge list in the last 10 years. (Yes, I HAVE been hosting this since 2011, can you believe it?) I can’t wait to hear what you all share, and good luck! I’ll choose and post the winner for November’s checkpoint, so be sure to comment by November 14th.
Roof Beam Reader 
for me it was Lake Silence by anne bishop i usually get disappointed with sequel or spin off so i let it in my tbr pile since i absolutely loved teh main series but surprise this is as good!!! and there are links with main series so we get to see more of some we missed it’s absolutely fabulous and so funny moment as well i just want more now
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Finished all 12 plus my two backups! This is my first year doing the challenge, and I had four 5-star reads from my TBR Pile Challenge list. I’d have to say my favorite was The Unit by Ninni Holmqvist. Thank you for hosting!
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I did not do the challenge because I was busy finishing up my master’s degree (why, if done, do I not have more free time, I wonder?). I am listening to a book currently that may be my best book of the year. It is called Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. It is about two friends who run into each other their junior year of college and begin working on a video game. I only listen to audio books when driving and today I was almost disappointed that my errand to New Hampshire got canceled because I would have had a nice uninterrupted time to listen.
Looking forward to the new PBS Mystery on Sunday night based on a book I enjoyed, The Magpie Murders.
Constance
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I’m working on book #11, which is huge. I might manage to finish in November? I’m maybe 1/4 of the way through.
I’ve participated in a lot of your TBR challenges, and looking over the list, I think I’ll pick “In the Steps of the Master,” by H. V. Morton — a tour of Palestine in 1929, before modernization. An amazing book.
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I’ve just got a couple more reviews to go and a book of short stories to read so all going well ( if I can get myself together to write!) I’ve read two memoirs that I can’t choose between: Dervla Murphy’s Wheels within Wheels and Paddy Leigh Fermor A Time of Gifts. They are both exceptional books about exceptional people, travelling with open minds and ferocious curiosity.
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Hey Jane! Your comment is the random winner for this mini-challenge. Can you send me an e-mail, or let me know how to get in touch with you?
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I’m still in this thing
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I’m still in this thing! I am behind in posting my last three reads and I have 3 more to go. I’ve done this challenge a handful of times and completed it each time except the last time.
I am hoping to finish this year, but we’ll see. I read two big ones for another group, Don Quixote and Atlas Shrugged. Altogether, I’d say those count for about 8 standard books! Ha!
To answer your question, it is hard to choose between the last three that I read.
I loved them all! And they happen to be the ones I need to post about.
They are: Dark Matter, Mr. Penumbra’s 24 Hour Bookstore and The Thorn Birds.
I may not reach my number goals this year but man, I have read some great books.
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I’ve read 10 of 12 so far. I started out the year very strong but have definitely slowed way down! My favorite has been Madeline Miller’s Song of Achilles. I’ve also really enjoyed Quiet, 84 Charing Cross Road, and Before the Ever After. The last two will be challenging. One is See What You Made Me Do, about domestic violence, and the other is The River by Peter Heller.
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Song of Achilles is probably in my Top 5. I’ve read it, and taught it, multiple times.
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I’m getting close, as I just finished #11, Stephen King’s ‘The Outsider.’ In regards to the challenge question, this was tricky, so I’ll give my top 3:
1) ‘The Book of Strange New Things’ by Michel Faber: https://iwouldratherbereadingblog.wordpress.com/2022/09/17/the-book-of-strange-new-things-by-michel-faber/
2) ‘On the Beach’ by Nevil Shute:
https://iwouldratherbereadingblog.wordpress.com/2022/07/12/book-review-on-the-beach-by-nevil-shute/
3) ‘Love in the Time of Cholera’ by Gabriel García Márquez:
https://iwouldratherbereadingblog.wordpress.com/2022/04/30/book-review-love-in-the-time-of-cholera-by-gabriel-garcia-marquez/
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